It’s time to implement a full ban on U.S. arms sales to Saudi Arabia.
If the UN Won’t Stop Saudi Arabia’s War in Yemen, the U.S. Should
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Ban Ki Moon
A Year Ago, I Crossed the DMZ in Korea. Here’s Why.
Until women get a place in the peace process, we’ll take our calls for an end to the Korean War to public streets all over the globe — and even across the DMZ.
Ban’s Misstep in Western Sahara
Can the UN secretary-general’s ill-advised trip to North Africa nevertheless pave the way to a settlement of the dispute over Western Sahara?
While We March for the Climate, Governments Meet with Polluters
As climate activists converge on New York, world leaders will meet behind closed doors with corporate honchos who bank on fossil fuels.
UN Again in the Crosshairs
The UN’s mythical black helicopters are back. The triumphant, reality-challenged new Republican majority in the House of Representatives imagine that they are flying in formation up the Potomac in a bid to take over the United States.
Waste at the UN?
No matter the administration in Washington, it’s always a good time to attack the United Nations. The familiar trope is “waste, mismanagement, and corruption.” The Oil for Food investigation during the Bush years, for instance, generated immense amounts of smoke but in the end very little fire. Now we learn that U.S. auditors have “found that the Pentagon can’t account for more than 95 percent of $9.1 billion in Iraq reconstruction money.” The media that actually mentioned the story failed to acknowledge that the money was in fact the surplus from the UN Oil for Food Fund.
60-Second Expert: Ban Ki Moon and R2P
Under the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine, the United Nations General Assembly addresses the international community’s failure to prevent and stop genocides, war crimes, and ethnic cleansing. Adopted at the World Summit in 2005, R2P expands the definition of such crimes against humanity to include those committed by a state within its own borders.
Ban Ki Moon and R2P
Kofi Annan’s greatest achievement as UN secretary general was his deft steering of the UN General Assembly to accept the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine at the 2005 World Summit.
What To Do Now in Georgia
There are no saints and even fewer geniuses in the conflict between Russia and Georgia over Ossetia. However, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, clearly the real power in Moscow, has certain proven himself even less saintly than other parties – and in the long term, less clever. Albeit with serious input from American miscalculations and atavistic politics and with the help of the hapless Georgian leader Mikheil Saakashvili, Putin has made both Russia, and the world, a more dangerous place.
Ban Ki Whom?
People used to equate the vice-presidency of the United States with a "pitcher of warm spit." Since Dick Cheney occupied the position, the spittle has become more potently venomous and the office consequently more important and noticeable. Similarly, the secretary-generalship of the United Nations is a very malleable office. The contrast with a predecessor’s personality can make the successor’s style more or less noticeable. Ban Ki Moon’s tenure so far has been on the low decibel end of the scale, even compared with Kofi Annan, who always spoke softly, realizing that there was no big stick at hand.